(A/N: While still pretty happy with my DVD arrivals, Chibi Anna still
rests in the harbor of my good mood. For now. Freaky stuff about to
happen. But nothing that 1) the chibis can't handle, or 2) that I own.
That was my disclaimer, for those of us who laugh late.
Small warning to keep a box of tissues nearby, because this chapter tends to be a real 'waterworks' of a chapter, if you catch my drift. Well, I warned you. This is NOT a chapter for the faint of heart!)
Chibi Beginnings:
Chapter 5: A Wed Skawf
Anna had spent all day scrubbing the floors, completely at the mercy of Tamara's blackmailing photo. With night upon the Asakura Complex at last, Anna now rests in her sleeping bag, hanging her head over a large textbook, barely awake.
Chibi Anna: (reading aloud) "An dew wew menny Ziggiewatts in aynchent Messy-potadoa..." (And there were many Ziggurats in ancient Mesopotamia...) She turns through the thick textbook by a large handful of pages. She begins to read aloud again. "...an da Wowmin Empyow wuz wed bi Joweuz Seezow..." (...and the Roman Empire was led by Julius Caesar...) She slams her forhead on the open book. *Aw, wud guwd iz aw dis Iytuhkow twaynin wen Iy'v gadda dew wudeva Tamawa sez. Owr dat bwad'll ged me twown owd.* (*Oh, what good is all this Itako training when I've got to do whatever Tamara say. Or that brat'll get me thrown out.*) She lifts her head from the book, peeling the pages off her face. She closees the large textbook, pulls her soft, pink pillow over, and lays her head down on the pillow. *Ow evun wuwz.* (*Or even worse.*) She closes her eyes.
(flashback: earlier that day)-----
Anna wears a stained pink dress while kneeling on the hall floor. She scrubs the floor slowly and vigorously with a white, tattered rag. She wrings out the rag over a bucket at her right. Yohmei slowly walks up behind her.
Yohmei: "Anna, Kino is waiting for you. She told me to find you as soon as Yoh came in so that you could start your own training."
Chibi Anna: She continues scrubbing the floors, not even turning to face Yohmei to respond to him. "Tew Keenow I'm dewin sumfin imowtend." (Tell Kino I'm doing something important.)
Yohmei: He raises an eyebrow. "More important that training, eh? Is something wrong, Anna? Normally, I'd have to punish you by taking away your training?"
Chibi Anna: *Nowmuwee. Bud nawd if yew noo dat I... dat I... dat I... wuv Yow. Bud iv yew kik me owd, Yow'd nevew weewyz dat...* (*Normally. But not if you knew that I... that I..., that I... love Yoh. But if you kick me out, Yoh would never know that...*)
Yohmei: "Anna, why are you doing Tamara's chores? You scrubbed the floor last week. And you were exhausted afterwards, I might add."
Chibi Anna: She stares blankly at the floor, scrubbing the same part of the floor with the same circular motion each and every time. She doesn't hear Yohmei at all.
Yohmei: "AHEM!"
Chibi Anna: She hears Yohmei loud and clear, then begins scrubbing the floor harder, faster, and more vigorously. "Owkay, Iy'm kweenin, Iy'm kweenin! Bee dun in a jyfee!" (Okay, I'm cleaning, I'm cleaning! Be done in a jiffy!) While quickly running the rag across the floor, she knocks over the water bucket. Water spills out across the floor. Anna frantically turns the bucket upright again, but all the water had already spilled out. "NOOOOUUUU!" (NOOOOOOOOO!) She kneels in the newly made puddle, as her dress hangs into the puddle. A tear slowly runs down her face.
Yohmei: "Anna, I'll get Yoh to pick up from here. You have training with Kino still."
Chibi Anna: "Tankz, Yowmey." (Thanks, Yohmei.) She stands up slowly, her bright pink dress now stained and dripping wet.
(flashback ends)-----
Chibi Anna: She hears a creak as her eyes shoot open.
The creek comes from the door to Anna's room as a small hand carrying a red cloth scarf slipped into Anna's room, dropping the scarf and a small wad of paper at the base of the door, then withdrawing immediately.
Chibi Anna: She sees the hand drop the scarf and the paper, and though not seeing who it was, she could definitely make a good educated guess. She wants to speak, but only small squeaks comes out at first. (half-squeak, half-whisper) "...yow...iz zat yew? ...yow?" (...Yoh... is that you? ...Yoh?) But somehow, in her heart of hearts, she didn't even need a response to know that she had guessed right as to the identity of her visitor. *It iz yew, Yow. Iy now yt.* (*It is you, Yoh. I know it.*) She slowly ascends from out of her sleeping bag, wearing a short black skirt, stretching from shoulder to mid-thigh. Slowly, pausing at the sound of the creaking floor, she sneaks her way over to the red scarf and the crumpled note. She crouches down and picks up the note first. She uncrumples the note to reveal a short note, though she can't make out what it says without any light. She takes both the note and the red scarf over to the window, holding one item in each of her hands. When she gets to the window, the writing on the paper becomes clearer.
The note was written with crayon, in a very childish chicken-scratch of handwritten font. The note reads: "Deew Annah, Yowmey towd me dat yew tawt yew wew weevin. Sow iy wuntid tew gyv yew dis skawf dat my gwama hewpd mee mayk. Doun fowged mee, pweez Annah..." (Dear Anna, Yohmei told me that you thought you were leaving. So I wanted to give you this scarf that my grandma help me make. Don't forget me, please Anna...)
Chibi Anna: At reading this portion of the note, her eyes overflows with tears as she crumples the note in her hand and holds it to her chest. She falls to her knees, crying, not bothering to read the rest of the note. *Ownwee wun pewsun yn da howz spewz miy naym wid an h! Yow, tanks! Yew wew nevva a guwd spewwew, bud tanks!* (*Only one person in the house spells my name with an h! Yoh, thanks! You were never a good speller, but thanks!*) After pulling herself together, she picks up the rest of the note and reads it.
The rest of the note read: "...bud pweez down' gow 'way, cuz..." (...but please don't go away, becuase...) The words "I wike yew" (I like you) were written, but were crossed out, then "I weewy wike yew" (I really like you) was written, but that was crossed out too. Finally, after all the chicken- scratch, the rest of the note read "...I wuv yew. I wuv yew Annah, an Iy'm nad asaymd to tew yew. Bud if yew weewy wanna weeve, Iy caw tew muc tew stawp yew, sow guwdby, Annah." (...I love you. I love you Anna, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. But if you really want to leave, I care too much to stop you, so goodbye, Anna.)
Chibi Anna: Her hands tremble violently as she reads the last two words of the letter aloud. "...guwdby, Annah..." (...goodbye Anna...) The note falls from her hands and onto the floor as her hands tremble. Tears well up in her eyes until she can no longer hold them. She collapses face-first onto the floor and bursts into tears. "Yow... Hee sed... guwdby..." (Yoh... He said... goodbye...)
Chibi Anna: After a while, she gets back to her feet and leaves her room. Later, she returns with two things, one of Yohmei's walking sticks, and a necklace of blue beads. She spreads out her new red scarf on the floor, into a square shape. In the center of that square, she places her favorite pink pillow, the blue beaded necklace that she got, her wet and stained pink dress that she likes to wear, and the small, crumpled piece of paper that she was reading only a little bit ago. She wraps up this small bit of stuff into her scarf and ties it up, then places it on the end of the walking stick she brought. She doesn't say a word through the whole time she packs.
The wooden doors to the stone fence of the Asakura Complex swung slowly open with an eerie creak. Anna stepped out the wooden gate, carrying over her shoulder the walking stick with the filled scarf at the end. She then turns back, to look on the Asakura Complex one last time.
Chibi Anna: She shuts her eyes. *O, spewitz, I dunno yf yew cun heew mee cuz I didn' lurn enie uv dowz fancee sayawnsiz, bud I down' weewy cayw. Juwsd yf deyr iz a spewit owt deyw dat cun heew mee, pweez, wutch owva Yow. Pweez, dat'z aw Iy azk.* (*Oh spirits, I don't know if you can hear me because I didn't learn any of those fancy séances, but I don't really care. Just if there is a spirit out there that can hear me, please, watch over Yoh. Please, that's all I ask.*) She quickly turns the other way and runs off into the dark before she changes her mind.
(A/N: Whew, what a (sniff, sniff) chapter! That was a real (sniff, sniff, sniff) tear-jerker near the end! (sniff, sniff...) I promised myself I wouldn't cry... and I STILL plan to uphold that promise, cuz' it ain't over till DrakeTheDuelist says so! And there's still more to come! Think 'happy ending'. Besides, like I said, Anna is still in my good graces, being the happy, 'I-have-new-anime-DVDs' sort of guy I am right now. And even way back when, four score and three fics ago, to "Yami Bakura Goes to Funbari", I probably STILL would've thought what I did to Anna was a bit extreme!
Well, if it's not abundantly clear, yeah, yeah, I don't own Shaman King or Yugioh, I was getting to that, but that's not the point I was getting to. I mean to say that this is NOT, I repeat NOT, with a big, fat caps-lock, NOT THE END OF THE FIC! There is some Yugioh stuff to come, and I still need to patch up some loose ends.)
Small warning to keep a box of tissues nearby, because this chapter tends to be a real 'waterworks' of a chapter, if you catch my drift. Well, I warned you. This is NOT a chapter for the faint of heart!)
Chibi Beginnings:
Chapter 5: A Wed Skawf
Anna had spent all day scrubbing the floors, completely at the mercy of Tamara's blackmailing photo. With night upon the Asakura Complex at last, Anna now rests in her sleeping bag, hanging her head over a large textbook, barely awake.
Chibi Anna: (reading aloud) "An dew wew menny Ziggiewatts in aynchent Messy-potadoa..." (And there were many Ziggurats in ancient Mesopotamia...) She turns through the thick textbook by a large handful of pages. She begins to read aloud again. "...an da Wowmin Empyow wuz wed bi Joweuz Seezow..." (...and the Roman Empire was led by Julius Caesar...) She slams her forhead on the open book. *Aw, wud guwd iz aw dis Iytuhkow twaynin wen Iy'v gadda dew wudeva Tamawa sez. Owr dat bwad'll ged me twown owd.* (*Oh, what good is all this Itako training when I've got to do whatever Tamara say. Or that brat'll get me thrown out.*) She lifts her head from the book, peeling the pages off her face. She closees the large textbook, pulls her soft, pink pillow over, and lays her head down on the pillow. *Ow evun wuwz.* (*Or even worse.*) She closes her eyes.
(flashback: earlier that day)-----
Anna wears a stained pink dress while kneeling on the hall floor. She scrubs the floor slowly and vigorously with a white, tattered rag. She wrings out the rag over a bucket at her right. Yohmei slowly walks up behind her.
Yohmei: "Anna, Kino is waiting for you. She told me to find you as soon as Yoh came in so that you could start your own training."
Chibi Anna: She continues scrubbing the floors, not even turning to face Yohmei to respond to him. "Tew Keenow I'm dewin sumfin imowtend." (Tell Kino I'm doing something important.)
Yohmei: He raises an eyebrow. "More important that training, eh? Is something wrong, Anna? Normally, I'd have to punish you by taking away your training?"
Chibi Anna: *Nowmuwee. Bud nawd if yew noo dat I... dat I... dat I... wuv Yow. Bud iv yew kik me owd, Yow'd nevew weewyz dat...* (*Normally. But not if you knew that I... that I..., that I... love Yoh. But if you kick me out, Yoh would never know that...*)
Yohmei: "Anna, why are you doing Tamara's chores? You scrubbed the floor last week. And you were exhausted afterwards, I might add."
Chibi Anna: She stares blankly at the floor, scrubbing the same part of the floor with the same circular motion each and every time. She doesn't hear Yohmei at all.
Yohmei: "AHEM!"
Chibi Anna: She hears Yohmei loud and clear, then begins scrubbing the floor harder, faster, and more vigorously. "Owkay, Iy'm kweenin, Iy'm kweenin! Bee dun in a jyfee!" (Okay, I'm cleaning, I'm cleaning! Be done in a jiffy!) While quickly running the rag across the floor, she knocks over the water bucket. Water spills out across the floor. Anna frantically turns the bucket upright again, but all the water had already spilled out. "NOOOOUUUU!" (NOOOOOOOOO!) She kneels in the newly made puddle, as her dress hangs into the puddle. A tear slowly runs down her face.
Yohmei: "Anna, I'll get Yoh to pick up from here. You have training with Kino still."
Chibi Anna: "Tankz, Yowmey." (Thanks, Yohmei.) She stands up slowly, her bright pink dress now stained and dripping wet.
(flashback ends)-----
Chibi Anna: She hears a creak as her eyes shoot open.
The creek comes from the door to Anna's room as a small hand carrying a red cloth scarf slipped into Anna's room, dropping the scarf and a small wad of paper at the base of the door, then withdrawing immediately.
Chibi Anna: She sees the hand drop the scarf and the paper, and though not seeing who it was, she could definitely make a good educated guess. She wants to speak, but only small squeaks comes out at first. (half-squeak, half-whisper) "...yow...iz zat yew? ...yow?" (...Yoh... is that you? ...Yoh?) But somehow, in her heart of hearts, she didn't even need a response to know that she had guessed right as to the identity of her visitor. *It iz yew, Yow. Iy now yt.* (*It is you, Yoh. I know it.*) She slowly ascends from out of her sleeping bag, wearing a short black skirt, stretching from shoulder to mid-thigh. Slowly, pausing at the sound of the creaking floor, she sneaks her way over to the red scarf and the crumpled note. She crouches down and picks up the note first. She uncrumples the note to reveal a short note, though she can't make out what it says without any light. She takes both the note and the red scarf over to the window, holding one item in each of her hands. When she gets to the window, the writing on the paper becomes clearer.
The note was written with crayon, in a very childish chicken-scratch of handwritten font. The note reads: "Deew Annah, Yowmey towd me dat yew tawt yew wew weevin. Sow iy wuntid tew gyv yew dis skawf dat my gwama hewpd mee mayk. Doun fowged mee, pweez Annah..." (Dear Anna, Yohmei told me that you thought you were leaving. So I wanted to give you this scarf that my grandma help me make. Don't forget me, please Anna...)
Chibi Anna: At reading this portion of the note, her eyes overflows with tears as she crumples the note in her hand and holds it to her chest. She falls to her knees, crying, not bothering to read the rest of the note. *Ownwee wun pewsun yn da howz spewz miy naym wid an h! Yow, tanks! Yew wew nevva a guwd spewwew, bud tanks!* (*Only one person in the house spells my name with an h! Yoh, thanks! You were never a good speller, but thanks!*) After pulling herself together, she picks up the rest of the note and reads it.
The rest of the note read: "...bud pweez down' gow 'way, cuz..." (...but please don't go away, becuase...) The words "I wike yew" (I like you) were written, but were crossed out, then "I weewy wike yew" (I really like you) was written, but that was crossed out too. Finally, after all the chicken- scratch, the rest of the note read "...I wuv yew. I wuv yew Annah, an Iy'm nad asaymd to tew yew. Bud if yew weewy wanna weeve, Iy caw tew muc tew stawp yew, sow guwdby, Annah." (...I love you. I love you Anna, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. But if you really want to leave, I care too much to stop you, so goodbye, Anna.)
Chibi Anna: Her hands tremble violently as she reads the last two words of the letter aloud. "...guwdby, Annah..." (...goodbye Anna...) The note falls from her hands and onto the floor as her hands tremble. Tears well up in her eyes until she can no longer hold them. She collapses face-first onto the floor and bursts into tears. "Yow... Hee sed... guwdby..." (Yoh... He said... goodbye...)
Chibi Anna: After a while, she gets back to her feet and leaves her room. Later, she returns with two things, one of Yohmei's walking sticks, and a necklace of blue beads. She spreads out her new red scarf on the floor, into a square shape. In the center of that square, she places her favorite pink pillow, the blue beaded necklace that she got, her wet and stained pink dress that she likes to wear, and the small, crumpled piece of paper that she was reading only a little bit ago. She wraps up this small bit of stuff into her scarf and ties it up, then places it on the end of the walking stick she brought. She doesn't say a word through the whole time she packs.
The wooden doors to the stone fence of the Asakura Complex swung slowly open with an eerie creak. Anna stepped out the wooden gate, carrying over her shoulder the walking stick with the filled scarf at the end. She then turns back, to look on the Asakura Complex one last time.
Chibi Anna: She shuts her eyes. *O, spewitz, I dunno yf yew cun heew mee cuz I didn' lurn enie uv dowz fancee sayawnsiz, bud I down' weewy cayw. Juwsd yf deyr iz a spewit owt deyw dat cun heew mee, pweez, wutch owva Yow. Pweez, dat'z aw Iy azk.* (*Oh spirits, I don't know if you can hear me because I didn't learn any of those fancy séances, but I don't really care. Just if there is a spirit out there that can hear me, please, watch over Yoh. Please, that's all I ask.*) She quickly turns the other way and runs off into the dark before she changes her mind.
(A/N: Whew, what a (sniff, sniff) chapter! That was a real (sniff, sniff, sniff) tear-jerker near the end! (sniff, sniff...) I promised myself I wouldn't cry... and I STILL plan to uphold that promise, cuz' it ain't over till DrakeTheDuelist says so! And there's still more to come! Think 'happy ending'. Besides, like I said, Anna is still in my good graces, being the happy, 'I-have-new-anime-DVDs' sort of guy I am right now. And even way back when, four score and three fics ago, to "Yami Bakura Goes to Funbari", I probably STILL would've thought what I did to Anna was a bit extreme!
Well, if it's not abundantly clear, yeah, yeah, I don't own Shaman King or Yugioh, I was getting to that, but that's not the point I was getting to. I mean to say that this is NOT, I repeat NOT, with a big, fat caps-lock, NOT THE END OF THE FIC! There is some Yugioh stuff to come, and I still need to patch up some loose ends.)